Posted: 10/04/07, 10:49 am Post subject: I have such weird luck with dogs... Could this be a GWP?

A few months back, we decided to get a dog. I've always been an animal rescuer, so I looked at several shelters. One day, I found a beautiful white dog with blue eyes. Everyone thought she was a husky/shepherd mix because of her build and the fact that she's solid white...

She was already microchipped, and after much sleuthing, I found out she was sold at a Petland and is a Siberian Husky. (There are not many white huskies out there, but it happens.)

Fast forward to 5 months later... We decided to get a companion for Allie (the husky), and my boyfriend wanted a lab or lab mix. Again, we searched many shelters and found a really sweet boy about an hour away. We took Allie there to meet him, and they got along famously within the first 30 seconds. So, we adopted him and took him home with us.

A week later, we got an appointment at the vet for his shots, and the vet started fawning all over our new dog (named Taz... my boyfriend's pick, not mine). He said that Taz was in beautiful shape, and a great specimen of a dog. I told him we got Taz from a shelter and asked him if he knew what, other than lab, he could be mixed with. The vet then told us that he thought Taz wasn't a mix at all, but a German Wirehaired Pointer. Apparently it's rare for them to be solid black, but it can happen.

The evidence:
1) His tail is docked at the appropriate length for a GWP. (Who would dock the tail of a random mutt?)
2) His dewclaws have also been removed. (Ok, this could be for any number of reasons...)
3) When we first got him home and let him out in the backyard, he froze in a pointing position at a tuft of grass.
4) He is the right size, weight, and has wiry fur.
5) We looked online at a lot of GWP pictures, and we feel confident that Taz, once at the appropriate weight (he's about 10lbs or so underweight) would look like almost any other GWP we saw online, if they were black.

He is almost solid black, but actually has random silvery-gray hairs on his back, and a silvery-gray patch under his chin. The vet estimates him at 2-3y/o.

So here's my question-- Is it possible that he is a GWP, and that I've adopted 2 "mixes" that are both rare colors of purebred dogs?